Speech Pathology for children and teens​.

Language

Speech therapy can support a child with a language delay or difficulty. There may be a concern with receptive language (comprehension), or expressive language (verbal communication) - the area of focus may include words/vocabulary, or sentence structure.

Some conditions that may benefit from speech therapy targeting language are sequential bi/multilingualism, autism, ADHD and intellectual disability.

Social Communication

Communication is complex. Understanding inferencing, empathy, verbal and non-verbal communication, and navigating social situations can be a challenge. Speech therapy for social communication gives your child the opportunity to learn, discuss, and practice social communication in a supportive environment.

In conditions involving anxiety, such as selective mutism, specialised techniques are used, as progress is possible when a child is able to feel more comfortable in a challenging setting.

Speech

When a child has difficulty producing certain speech sounds or words, it may affect their ability to be understood. This can sometimes lead to reduced confidence. 

Elsternwick Speech Pathology can advise on age-appropriateness of a child's speech and whether therapy is recommended. 

In a childcare, kinder or Prep settings, Elsternwick Speech Pathology conducts "screening" tests for groups. This takes approximately 20-30 minutes per child and aims to identify whether a child's communication is on track or if additional support is recommended.

Literacy

Many children pick up reading, writing and spelling easily in their first few years of school. However we are not biologically primed to understand written language and for many (approximately 25% of the population) progress can require addtional support.

 Elsternwick Speech Pathology supports early literacy (reading, writing, spelling) using a synthetic phonics program, such as Sounds-Write.